About Sabyasachi
Hello everyone!
Here I come to share my story with you all. I am Sabyasachi Sarkhel, was born on 1960 in a Bengali family where music was always an area of interest for the members. My ancestors were originally from Barisal, Bangladesh, but after riot they moved to West Bengal and started afresh. My family, especially my father, Late Shri Santi Ranjan Sarkhel was always remained a great supporter to my career. In Bengali families it is very common practice to put forward the young children into any kind of art form besides their school education. I was no exception and was made known to sitar. Being the first member of the family, it was not that easy to pursue music, but somehow phases of life guided me to come to that point to finally gather the courage and start the new journey. I am very thankful to almighty for that.
Education: I have started my school in Burdwan and then completed my B.Sc. in Zoology from The University of Burdwan. Then I finished my M.A. in Instrumental Music (sitar) from Rabindra Bharati University with a 1stclass 1st position and two gold medals were bestowed upon me. I received a Ph.D. degree under the supervision of Prof. Sisirkona Dhar Choudhury from the same university.
Music: For me, music is an inner journey that gives you pure bliss, serenity and happiness. If someone persistently keeps doing practice with dedication, determination and proper guidance, then and then only music becomes like an internal dialogue that makes the magic. My journey of music started long time back with Shri Ardhendu Shekhar Roy who introduced me with sitar for the very first time. Then I was under the tutelage of Pandit Suresh Misra (a disciple of Pandit D.T. Joshi and Ustad Vilayat Khan). Later my idea of music became more intense and extended under the supervision of Pandit D.T. Joshi himself who has vouchsafed me the legacy of Imdadkhani style. I consider myself a humble student and a follower of this style. I zealously want to preserve this traditional and authentic baaj with my strings and strokes.
Career: I always find a genuine interest in teaching as this is the way that I can share my experiences whatever I have learnt, how I practice and think. To me, Guru-shishya parampara in Indian music is a kind of inheritance that is passed on to the next generation. So, I chose my professional career as a teacher and started at Narendrapur Ramakrishna Mission. Later, I joined the department of Hindusthani Classical Music, Sangit Bhavana, Visva-Bharati in 1994. Presently I am working here as the senior most professor and Head of the department.
I am actively associated with a large number of educational platforms for Indian music of India and abroad. I perform sitar and share my experiences through seminars, lecture demonstrations or workshops. I have published many articles and research papers regarding music in a number of important journals and magazines. I have published a book titled as “Setarer Bibartane Jaipur Senia O Imdadkhani Gharana” filled with researched information and documents. Some of my audio CDs like Shraddhanjali (True Eastern Music, Kolkata), Esho Chiro Sundoro (South Korea) etc. are available to you all.
Gurus
Guru is the enlightened soul who removes our darkness with his own light. He is the one who gives the path to be taken and make us realize the eternal truth. I am blessed to have them as my gurus as they made me to look at life through the prism of music and that changed my idea of music as well as my idea of life. I have developed my basic idea of sitar from Shri Ardhendu Shekhar Roy. Then I was under the tutelage of Pandit Suresh Chandra Misra and Pandit D.T. Joshi.
Pandit Dhruva Tara Joshi:
Pandit Dhruva Tara Joshi (D.T. Joshi) was a doyen of Imdadkhani Gharana, an incredible vocalist, a great scholar, a composer, a teacher, an administrator, a renowned poet and above all a great human being. He was one of the leading disciples of Ustad Enayat Khan Sahab. He was born on 1st October, 1912 in Lucknow in a very educated and cultured family. His father, Tara Dutta Joshi was a journalist and a lawyer, his mother, Manorama Devi, was a doctor. Tara Dutta Joshi was from Maharashtra and Manorama Devi was a Bengali lady and they settled in Lucknow.
Pt. D.T. Joshi was a remarkable student of Lucknow University and Calcutta University and completed his M.A. in philosophy. In Kolkata he learnt from Ustad Enayat Khan Sahab. After his demise he took vocal training from Aftab-e-mausiqi Ustad Faiyaz Khan of Agra as a ‘gandabandh shagird’.
He served for All India Radio in Lucknow and Delhi as deputy chief producer. He was the Dean of faculty in Indira Kala Sangit Mahavidyalaya, Khairagarh from its inception. Then he worked in the department of music in Visva-Bharati and served there as a Dean and Head of the Department. He is the founder of music faculty of The University of Burdwan. He was associated with many universities and other prestigious platforms like Delhi University, Banaras Hindu University, Rabindra Bharati University, Sangeet Research Academy, Sangit Natak Akademy etc. he was a fellow of Sangit Natak Akademy and awarded as D. Lit from Rabindra Bharati University and The University of Burdwan.
Pandit D.T. Joshi was a great scholar in music. His lectures, seminars, interviews were always a great source of knowledge. His numerous vocal and instrumental compositions are always remained very special to the musicians. He used Premrang and Rasik piya as his pen names. He was a famous urdu poet and wrote many poems with the name “Junu Lucknawii”.
He had many students both of vocal and instrumental music who have become greatly successful in their fields. He passed away on 28th September, 1993 in Burdwan.
Pandit Suresh Misra
Pandit Suresh Misra was born in a zamindar family on……. In a village of Hardoi, Uttar Pradesh. He had a deep thirst for music and started to learn sitar in Bhatkhande Music College of Lucknow. He got the opportunity to learn from Pandit S. N. Ratanjhankar, Ustad Ilias Khan and many other great musicians of our country. Then he was under the tutelage of Pt. D. T. Joshi. After that, he tied the ganda (thread ceremony) from Ustad Vilayat Khan and learnt from him too.
He worked in Indira Kala Sangit Mahavidyalaya of Khairagarh and then in Visva-Bharati of Santiniketan. He was the H.O.D. and Dean of Music Faculty there. He served as visiting professor in Amsterdam University. He was a renowned musician of All India Radio and Doordarshan, performed in many prestigious concerts in India and abroad. He trained many students who came to him from all over the world. He passed away on 17th of May, 2002 in Santiniketan.
The style
Imdadkhani style or Imdadkhani gharana or Etawah - Farukhabad gharana is one the most celebrated style in sitar. As the name shows, Imdadkhani gharana was introduced by Ustad Imdad Khan Sahab, son and disciple of Ustad Sahabdad Khan Sahab of Etawah. Though sitar was played from the time of Turab Khan in this family, but Imdad Khan Sahab taken it to new heights. Being a descendent of a musical family of great musical heritage, sitar came in a very obvious way in his life. He travelled around the country, learnt music, gathered musical elements from everywhere, dedicated his whole life into restless and rigorous riyaz and established a unique style was established which was nothing but a revolution. His musical lineage was carried by his two sons, Ustad Enayat Khan Sahab and Ustad Wahid Khan Sahab. They were two great maestros of this gharana. Their contribution to sitar levelled up this legacy and spread this style throughout the country. In the next generation, Ustad Vilayat Khan Sahab and his brother Ustad Imrat Khan Shahab have become true sensations on stage. Their unimaginable speed, spectacular skill and way more soothing appeal added something beyond the conventional way of music. There is no doubt to accept the involvement of various royal courts, Maharajas, aristocratic families and music lovers to patronize this legacy.
Imdadkhani style is all about a beautiful balance of tantrakari ang and gayaki ang; and the style has advanced in each generation. The musicians of this gharana did a continuous research on the structural and stylistic point of views to make it achieve a status very near to a vocal performance. These researches helped a lot in the evolution and development of sitar and its baaj. According to the modern scholars, a common fact emerges that there was no mention of sitar before 18th century. By the most acceptable opinion, Khusro Khan (often mistaken with Ameer Khusro, contemporary to Allauddin Khilji, 13th century), brother of Niyamat Khan Shah Sadarang, was a renowned Veenker and was the first sitar player. The primary structure of sitar was very much different from today’s model. It had only 3 strings, 14-16 frets and 3 tumbas (resonator). Gradually strings were increased from 3 to 7, chikaris and sympathetic strings (tarab) were added, number of tumbas were decreased into two and frets were increased in number. In this way, the preliminary structure was modified into the modern sitar by the exponents of different gharanas for the development of playing styles and techniques. The leading pioneers of this evolution were the musicians of Jaipur-Senia gharana (Maseet Khan, Raza Khan, Amrit Sen and so on) and Ustad Imdad Khan of Itawah - Farukhabad gharana. Imdad Khan followed the trend of playing in one-stroke-one note format, where right hand was more predominant and different bols, gat-todas were executed with extremely high speed. He introduced chikaris, jhala, use of paran, tukda, rhythmic tihais, 12 ang alaap etc. to sitar, that mainly reflects dhrupad style. His son, Ustad Enayat Khan, took this revolutionary work a step further with his great inventory ideas and musicianship. He too emphasized on right hand but also paid attention to the left-hand movements. He used to perform alaap on surbahar first and later gat on sitar. He was the first who introduced ekhara sapat taan which was totally a khayal element. In this way, sitar started to change, both structurally and technically. Enayat Khan’s son, “Aftaab-e-sitar”, Ustad Vilayat Khan Sahab upgraded the sitar from dhrupad-ang based-sitar to khayal-ang based sitar. He introduced lots of notable changes in structure and techniques, where continuity of a note was much longer and sustained. Vilayat Khan predominantly used left hand techniques to exploit the extension of notes and started mirroring intricate khayal components i.e. complex murkis, khatka, lahak, halak etc. As he was an excellent vocalist that kept him adherent to project a lyrical and flowy approach to sitar and that made everyone say - “his sitar virtually sings”. His brother Imrat Khan Sahab added his exceptional aesthetic thoughts about music to this baaj.
Their successors like Shujaat Khan, Nishat Khan, Shahid Pervez Khan, Irshad Khan, Hidayat Khan, Zila Khan established themselves as the worthy heirs of this lineage. On the other hand, amongst the disciples of Imdadkhani gharana i.e. D. T. Joshi, Birendra Kishore Roy Choudhury, Bimalendu Mukherjee, Bimalakanta Roy Choudhury, Jitendra Mohan Sengupta, Benjamin Gomes (disciples of Ustad Enayet Khan), Arvind Parikh, Kashinath Chatterjee, John Gomes, Kalyani Roy, Peter Manuel, Suresh Misra, Dharambir Singh, Harvindar Sharma (disciples of Ustad Vilayat Khan), Budhaditya Mukherjee and so on are the most notable names to be mentioned.